In recent years, in clinical tests for diagnosing the state of health of patients, clinical tests utilizing immunochromatography have often been used. Immunochromatography has the excellent features of (1) not requiring any special measurement machines and enabling visual determination, (2) enabling the tests to be completed in an extremely short time of several minutes or so, and (3) being simple in test operation and not requiring any special skill. Due to these features, immunochromatography is used mainly for testing for influenza and other viruses and testing for bacterial infection at medical facilities. It enables the quick start of treatment and accurate action after the test diagnosis.
The tests for viruses and the tests for bacterial infection by immunochromatography are mainly performed on specimens obtained by cotton swabs and other swabs and specimen samplers from the nasal cavities, throats, mucous membranes, etc. of patients. An obtained specimen is immersed in an extraction solution to be dispersed or dissolved to prepare a development solution for immunochromatography measurement. As shown in FIG. 18, the extraction solution 6′ in which this specimen is dispersed is added dropwise in a predetermined amount from an addition hole 43′ provided in the surface of a housing 42′ in which an immunochromatography test strip 41′ is inserted to thereby be introduced into the test strip 41′. At that time, if a highly contagious virus or bacteria etc. is contained in the specimen, the specimen extraction solution and the used specimen sampler are liable to infect a handler touching them, the specimen extraction solution is liable to splatter or leak to the outside environment, and the specimen sampler is liable to contact the outside environment etc. resulting in microbial contamination. For this reason, measures have to be taken against infection and microbial contamination not only during the tests, but until the specimen sampler and specimen extraction solution etc. are discarded after the test.
Therefore, the applicant has proposed test kits enabling prevention of contact with the handler and leakage etc. to the outside environment (PLT 1 and PLT 2).
The test kit proposed in PLT 1 is mainly provided with a specimen sampling part, a container inside of which a specimen extraction solution is held, and a sealing lid with a specimen sampler holding function for sealing an opening part of the container while the specimen sampler is held in the container. For this reason, this test kit can seal the specimen extraction solution and the used specimen sampler in the space formed by the container and the sealing lid with a specimen sampler holding function after moving the specimen sampled by the specimen sampler to the specimen extraction solution.
Further, the test kit proposed in PLT 2 is mainly provided with a specimen sampler provided with a specimen sampling part at one end in its longitudinal direction and with a cap part at the other end in its longitudinal direction and provided with a shaft part between the same and a specimen preparing container inside of which a preparation solution is held and able to hold the specimen sampling part of the specimen sampler and the shaft part. This test kit enables a user to hold the cap part of the specimen sampler to sample a specimen, move the specimen to the preparation solution, then store the specimen sampling part and shaft part of the specimen sampler in the specimen preparing container, use the held cap part to seal the open part of the specimen preparing container in that state, and thereby seal the specimen preparation solution and the used specimen sampler in the specimen preparing container.